Belgians are crazy about beer. Young Belgians areweaned on beer with soda, and old Belgians drink itwith breakfast. Even the monks in Belgium makebeer. The country has been in the brewing traditionsince the 1100s—before it even was a country—andtime has only served to open the doors for more andbetter ways to make the inebriating honey of thegods. We visited a few places in Belgium where beeris nigh religion and tasted for ourselves the holyfervor that has stood to make this country abastion of alcoholic enlightenment. In the process,we've come to an inescapable conclusion: These guys are crazy about beer, and we love it.

比利時人民瘋狂地愛著啤酒。在比利時，孩子們從小就習慣上喝摻了蘇打的啤酒，而大人們更是連早飯也要就著啤酒來吃。連比利時的僧侶們也會釀造啤酒。比利時的啤酒釀造傳統可以追溯到公元12世紀—— 當然這是早于比利時王國成立的 —— 而歷史的作用也僅僅只是讓比利時向全世界敞開了釀酒的大門以及讓人們能更多地喝到這醉人的神露。我們造訪了一些在比利時具有特殊意義的地方，因為在這些地方啤酒已經近乎一種宗教圣物了;同時我們也感受到了比利時人對酒的狂熱，正是這樣的狂熱才讓比利時得享"酒鄉"的美譽。造訪過程中，我們無可避免地要得出這樣的結論：這群人瘋狂地愛著啤酒，但我們也愛著他們的瘋狂。

10.Beers Per Capita

10.種類繁多的啤酒

Belgium has more individual styles of beer per capita than any other country in the world. Witha population barely scraping past 11 million, they produced a whopping 1,132 distinct typesof beer in 2011. Fast-forward to 2023 and that number is a mind-blowing 3,043 beers thatwere brewed among all 10 provinces of Belgium. The Flemish Brabant, a province in the north ofBelgium, makes 457 beers on its own.

比利時所擁有的啤酒品類多于世界上任何一個國家。雖然整個國家總人口還不到區區1千1百萬，但他們卻在2011年釀造出總數多達1132種不同種類的啤酒。到了2023年這個數字爆炸性地增加到3043種，這是整個比利時10個省區的釀造總數。而其中位于比利時北部的佛蘭德布拉班特省釀造出了其中的457種。

The region's interest in beer began when the Catholic Church sanctioned the use of abbeys tobrew and distribute beer to raise money for upkeep near the end of the 10th century. Over theyears, the nuns in the abbeys began pioneering new ways to brew, strengthening the diversitythat was available to the locals in brewing villages. At the turn of the 20th century, there wereover 3,000 breweries in Belgium, but the two World Wars had a devastating effect on theBelgian economy that reached deep into the brewing industry. Now, there are only about 180breweries in Belgium.

比利時地區對啤酒的熱愛起源于10紀末左右，天主教會占領該地區的修道院開始釀造并銷售啤酒使寺院能夠自負盈虧。時光飛逝，寺院的修女們開始研發新的釀造手段，此舉的目的是為了讓當地的酒坊也能夠釀造出更多種類的啤酒。到了20世紀初，比利時已經有超過3000家啤酒廠，但隨后的兩次世界大戰對比利時的經濟造成了毀滅性影響，釀酒行業也沒能幸免于難。如今，比利時僅僅只有180家啤酒廠。

9.Spontaneous Fermentation

9.自然發酵的美味

Known in Belgium as lambic, spontaneously fermented beers have been brewed since the 14thcentury. The process isn't at all unique to Belgium, but they're certainly pioneering the modernform of spontaneous fermentation. Normal beer is made with three ingredients—malt, hops,and yeast. The malt makes it sweet, the hops add the bitter taste, and the yeast ferments thewhole thing into alcohol.

朗貝克啤酒在比利時享譽盛名，這是一種早在14世紀就發明出來的自然發酵的啤酒。雖然釀造過程在比利時屬于非常常見的，但他們確實發明了現在所稱的自然發酵的形式。

Typically, the yeast is added from a package or a live culture. Saccharomyces cerevisiae is acommon brewing yeast, although there are others. But in spontaneous fermentation, themalt and hops are left to cool in the open air. This introduces wild yeast into the mixture, givingthe brew a quality that is unique to the region where it was brewed, since it depends on thenatural yeasts in the air to start the fermentation. Lambic is made exclusively in Belgium'sZenne valley, where the wild yeasts Brettanomyces bruxellensis and Brettanomyces lambicusthrive. Lambic by itself is acidic and flat, but if there's one thing you can say about Belgianbrewers, it's that they never give up on a beer. To fix it, they brew a batch of lambic and thenage it for six months. Then, they brew a fresh batch and mix the two together. Finally, while it'sstill fermenting, they bottle it, trapping the carbon dioxide and keeping it nice and bubbly. Whenyou throw all those steps together, the result is an even more unique beer type known asGeuze (pronounced like a heavily accented "goose"). Now that's dedication.

啤酒通常由三種原料制成：麥芽、啤酒花和酵母。麥芽能使啤酒香甜可口，啤酒花能帶來啤酒特有的苦澀味，而酵母能讓這些原料發酵變成酒精。通常情況，酵母會以酵素包或者活酵母培養基的形式加入。啤酒酵母菌就是一種常見的釀酒酵母，盡管還有其他的酵母菌。但在自然發酵工藝中，麥芽和啤酒花都會混合起來晾曬在空氣中使之自然冷卻。這時會在這種混合物加入天然酵母菌，這個步驟會使每樣成品都有一種特殊的性質，因為這取決于混合物內部的天然酵母自然發酵的時間。郎貝克啤酒只在比利時的珊妮谷才有生產，這里是布魯塞爾屬和朗貝克屬這些天然酒香酵母的盛產地。朗貝克啤酒本身味道平平并且很酸澀，不過還是要贊美一下比利時的釀酒藝人們，就是他們絕對不會放棄任何一種似乎要失敗的釀造。為解決這個問題，他們會首先釀造第一批朗貝克啤酒，然后將它們陳放六個月。六個月后他們會釀造第二批朗貝克，然后將新舊兩批混合在一起。最后，雖然兩批都還在發酵過程，但匠人們依舊直接裝瓶，將二氧化碳密封起來，將還在冒著泡沫的啤酒存放好。當他們將所有的步驟完成后，釀造的結果是另一種更加獨特的啤酒——古斯(Geuze:發音類似于單詞"goose"發重音)啤酒。這就是全部工藝了!

8.Beer Cocktails

8.啤酒式雞尾酒

Jurgen Bollion and his brother Steven are the joint owners of the Taste M, a little bar bolted tothe front of a small art museum in Leuven. Jurgen, a jovial man with a linebacker build andperpetually flushed cheeks, visits each table in person with a tray full of "fixings" for hissignature drinks: beer cocktails.

尤爾根·博利昂和他的弟弟史蒂芬·博利昂是Taste M店的合伙經營人。Taste M是位于比利時勒芬市一個美術館門口的一家小酒吧。掌柜尤爾根是個有著和橄欖球后衛球員一樣壯碩身材，但整天都樂呵呵的男人，他會照顧到酒吧里每一桌上的每一位客人，當然還會給他們倒上他的招牌酒品：啤酒雞尾酒。

The only way to describe a beer cocktail is "whatever Jurgen wants to put in it." But you're ingood hands. As he works, he explains what each ingredient does for the drink: Sweetwood(part of the licorice family) for a tart flavor, tonic for a bitter middle taste, several shots of ginfor strength, a bottle of Caulier 28 tripel for the beer, and ice to give the flavor more variety.He explains that, as the ice melts and the sweetwood seeps into the drink, the flavor changes,making each sip a little different. Then he makes a round of the table to tip more gin into eachglass with a gruff "drink more." And that's just one cocktail. Jurgen has created hundreds ofrecipes for unique beer cocktails, each one meant to emphasize a different taste profile. Oneof his goals is to get past the perception that beer is a "man's" drink. In his words, everybodylikes beer, you just have to find the right one—"They say to me, ‘I don't like beer.' And I say, ‘No, you don't like the beers that you have tried up to this point.' " He wants to findeverybody's perfect beer. That's a man with an admirable mission.

我想只能用一句話來形容什么叫啤酒雞尾酒：隨便尤爾根往里面放什么都成。但他肯定會把你照顧周到。因為在尤爾根調配雞尾酒的時候，他會告訴你酒里的每種成分。月桂(甘草綱目中的一種)能帶來酸酸的味道，奎寧水的苦味能夠中和酸味，隨后加入的杜松子酒能夠強化味覺上的刺激，再在啤酒里斟上一瓶Caulier 28triple蘋果酒混合，最后冰塊的加入能夠使這杯雞尾酒的味道更加多元化。他如此解釋道，因為味道會隨著冰塊的逐漸融化以及月桂的不斷滲入而不斷變化，這就使得你每酌一口都會有不同體驗。最后他還會在酒吧里轉一圈給每位客人再添上一些杜松子酒，每次都會粗聲粗氣地說著："要多喝點哦!" 這還只是尤爾根調配的其中一種。尤爾根了發明了好幾百種獨特的啤酒雞尾酒配方，而每一種配方都有一種最強烈的味道。其實尤爾根這樣做有一個目的——讓人們都認同啤酒就是"男人們的飲料"。用他自己的話來說，就是每個人都是喜歡啤酒的，而你只需要找到最適合你的口味，"他們對我說，‘我不喜歡啤酒'，但是我對他們說，‘不是這樣的，你只是不喜歡你現在喝的這種口味。'"他甚至想給全世界每個人都找出一種最適合他們的啤酒。他的這種持之以恒的態度確實令我們感到敬佩。

7."The Longest Bar In The World"

7.世界上最長的酒吧街

This is a local colloquialism for a square officially known as the Oude Market, located in Leuven.The market is basically a long, open courtyard with a line of businesses running along one side.So why is it called the longest bar in Europe? Well, over 40 of those businesses just happen tobe bars. Since each bar has an outdoor patio, the experience is one of an unbroken outdoorterrace that runs for nearly half a kilometer (0.3 mi).

這其實是一個位于比利時勒芬市被當地人稱作老市場的廣場而已。廣場其實是一條長長的半邊商業步行街式的庭院。那為什么要稱其為歐洲最長的酒吧街呢?其實是因為這條步行街上有超過40家酒吧。基于這里的每家酒吧都設置了室外的露天區，因此置身其中你就能感受到一個完整的露天平臺區都長達(0.3英里)半公里。

Of course, despite its name, it's not actually the longest bar in the world, or even Europe. Thereare several contenders to the title, most of them named by generations of locals who grew upwith the phrase and simply want to keep it alive in their home town. Nevertheless, the OudeMarket is a unique place to visit, and one of the bars, Domus, is even supplied by a directpipeline to its nearby brewery.And the other side of the square? That's a university. In manyparts of Belgium, especially Leuven, college students get beers for

Belgians are crazy about beer. Young Belgians areweaned on beer with soda, and old Belgians drink itwith breakfast. Even the monks in Belgium makebeer. The country has been in the brewing traditionsince the 1100s—before it even was a country—andtime has only served to open the doors for more andbetter ways to make the inebriating honey of thegods. We visited a few places in Belgium where beeris nigh religion and tasted for ourselves the holyfervor that has stood to make this country abastion of alcoholic enlightenment. In the process,we've come to an inescapable conclusion: These guys are crazy about beer, and we love it.

比利時人民瘋狂地愛著啤酒。在比利時，孩子們從小就習慣上喝摻了蘇打的啤酒，而大人們更是連早飯也要就著啤酒來吃。連比利時的僧侶們也會釀造啤酒。比利時的啤酒釀造傳統可以追溯到公元12世紀—— 當然這是早于比利時王國成立的 —— 而歷史的作用也僅僅只是讓比利時向全世界敞開了釀酒的大門以及讓人們能更多地喝到這醉人的神露。我們造訪了一些在比利時具有特殊意義的地方，因為在這些地方啤酒已經近乎一種宗教圣物了;同時我們也感受到了比利時人對酒的狂熱，正是這樣的狂熱才讓比利時得享"酒鄉"的美譽。造訪過程中，我們無可避免地要得出這樣的結論：這群人瘋狂地愛著啤酒，但我們也愛著他們的瘋狂。

10.Beers Per Capita

10.種類繁多的啤酒

Belgium has more individual styles of beer per capita than any other country in the world. Witha population barely scraping past 11 million, they produced a whopping 1,132 distinct typesof beer in 2011. Fast-forward to 2023 and that number is a mind-blowing 3,043 beers thatwere brewed among all 10 provinces of Belgium. The Flemish Brabant, a province in the north ofBelgium, makes 457 beers on its own.

比利時所擁有的啤酒品類多于世界上任何一個國家。雖然整個國家總人口還不到區區1千1百萬，但他們卻在2011年釀造出總數多達1132種不同種類的啤酒。到了2023年這個數字爆炸性地增加到3043種，這是整個比利時10個省區的釀造總數。而其中位于比利時北部的佛蘭德布拉班特省釀造出了其中的457種。

The region's interest in beer began when the Catholic Church sanctioned the use of abbeys tobrew and distribute beer to raise money for upkeep near the end of the 10th century. Over theyears, the nuns in the abbeys began pioneering new ways to brew, strengthening the diversitythat was available to the locals in brewing villages. At the turn of the 20th century, there wereover 3,000 breweries in Belgium, but the two World Wars had a devastating effect on theBelgian economy that reached deep into the brewing industry. Now, there are only about 180breweries in Belgium.

比利時地區對啤酒的熱愛起源于10紀末左右，天主教會占領該地區的修道院開始釀造并銷售啤酒使寺院能夠自負盈虧。時光飛逝，寺院的修女們開始研發新的釀造手段，此舉的目的是為了讓當地的酒坊也能夠釀造出更多種類的啤酒。到了20世紀初，比利時已經有超過3000家啤酒廠，但隨后的兩次世界大戰對比利時的經濟造成了毀滅性影響，釀酒行業也沒能幸免于難。如今，比利時僅僅只有180家啤酒廠。

9.Spontaneous Fermentation

9.自然發酵的美味

Known in Belgium as lambic, spontaneously fermented beers have been brewed since the 14thcentury. The process isn't at all unique to Belgium, but they're certainly pioneering the modernform of spontaneous fermentation. Normal beer is made with three ingredients—malt, hops,and yeast. The malt makes it sweet, the hops add the bitter taste, and the yeast ferments thewhole thing into alcohol.

朗貝克啤酒在比利時享譽盛名，這是一種早在14世紀就發明出來的自然發酵的啤酒。雖然釀造過程在比利時屬于非常常見的，但他們確實發明了現在所稱的自然發酵的形式。

Typically, the yeast is added from a package or a live culture. Saccharomyces cerevisiae is acommon brewing yeast, although there are others. But in spontaneous fermentation, themalt and hops are left to cool in the open air. This introduces wild yeast into the mixture, givingthe brew a quality that is unique to the region where it was brewed, since it depends on thenatural yeasts in the air to start the fermentation. Lambic is made exclusively in Belgium'sZenne valley, where the wild yeasts Brettanomyces bruxellensis and Brettanomyces lambicusthrive. Lambic by itself is acidic and flat, but if there's one thing you can say about Belgianbrewers, it's that they never give up on a beer. To fix it, they brew a batch of lambic and thenage it for six months. Then, they brew a fresh batch and mix the two together. Finally, while it'sstill fermenting, they bottle it, trapping the carbon dioxide and keeping it nice and bubbly. Whenyou throw all those steps together, the result is an even more unique beer type known asGeuze (pronounced like a heavily accented "goose"). Now that's dedication.

啤酒通常由三種原料制成：麥芽、啤酒花和酵母。麥芽能使啤酒香甜可口，啤酒花能帶來啤酒特有的苦澀味，而酵母能讓這些原料發酵變成酒精。通常情況，酵母會以酵素包或者活酵母培養基的形式加入。啤酒酵母菌就是一種常見的釀酒酵母，盡管還有其他的酵母菌。但在自然發酵工藝中，麥芽和啤酒花都會混合起來晾曬在空氣中使之自然冷卻。這時會在這種混合物加入天然酵母菌，這個步驟會使每樣成品都有一種特殊的性質，因為這取決于混合物內部的天然酵母自然發酵的時間。郎貝克啤酒只在比利時的珊妮谷才有生產，這里是布魯塞爾屬和朗貝克屬這些天然酒香酵母的盛產地。朗貝克啤酒本身味道平平并且很酸澀，不過還是要贊美一下比利時的釀酒藝人們，就是他們絕對不會放棄任何一種似乎要失敗的釀造。為解決這個問題，他們會首先釀造第一批朗貝克啤酒，然后將它們陳放六個月。六個月后他們會釀造第二批朗貝克，然后將新舊兩批混合在一起。最后，雖然兩批都還在發酵過程，但匠人們依舊直接裝瓶，將二氧化碳密封起來，將還在冒著泡沫的啤酒存放好。當他們將所有的步驟完成后，釀造的結果是另一種更加獨特的啤酒——古斯(Geuze:發音類似于單詞"goose"發重音)啤酒。這就是全部工藝了!

8.Beer Cocktails

8.啤酒式雞尾酒

Jurgen Bollion and his brother Steven are the joint owners of the Taste M, a little bar bolted tothe front of a small art museum in Leuven. Jurgen, a jovial man with a linebacker build andperpetually flushed cheeks, visits each table in person with a tray full of "fixings" for hissignature drinks: beer cocktails.

尤爾根·博利昂和他的弟弟史蒂芬·博利昂是Taste M店的合伙經營人。Taste M是位于比利時勒芬市一個美術館門口的一家小酒吧。掌柜尤爾根是個有著和橄欖球后衛球員一樣壯碩身材，但整天都樂呵呵的男人，他會照顧到酒吧里每一桌上的每一位客人，當然還會給他們倒上他的招牌酒品：啤酒雞尾酒。

The only way to describe a beer cocktail is "whatever Jurgen wants to put in it." But you're ingood hands. As he works, he explains what each ingredient does for the drink: Sweetwood(part of the licorice family) for a tart flavor, tonic for a bitter middle taste, several shots of ginfor strength, a bottle of Caulier 28 tripel for the beer, and ice to give the flavor more variety.He explains that, as the ice melts and the sweetwood seeps into the drink, the flavor changes,making each sip a little different. Then he makes a round of the table to tip more gin into eachglass with a gruff "drink more." And that's just one cocktail. Jurgen has created hundreds ofrecipes for unique beer cocktails, each one meant to emphasize a different taste profile. Oneof his goals is to get past the perception that beer is a "man's" drink. In his words, everybodylikes beer, you just have to find the right one—"They say to me, ‘I don't like beer.' And I say, ‘No, you don't like the beers that you have tried up to this point.' " He wants to findeverybody's perfect beer. That's a man with an admirable mission.

我想只能用一句話來形容什么叫啤酒雞尾酒：隨便尤爾根往里面放什么都成。但他肯定會把你照顧周到。因為在尤爾根調配雞尾酒的時候，他會告訴你酒里的每種成分。月桂(甘草綱目中的一種)能帶來酸酸的味道，奎寧水的苦味能夠中和酸味，隨后加入的杜松子酒能夠強化味覺上的刺激，再在啤酒里斟上一瓶Caulier 28triple蘋果酒混合，最后冰塊的加入能夠使這杯雞尾酒的味道更加多元化。他如此解釋道，因為味道會隨著冰塊的逐漸融化以及月桂的不斷滲入而不斷變化，這就使得你每酌一口都會有不同體驗。最后他還會在酒吧里轉一圈給每位客人再添上一些杜松子酒，每次都會粗聲粗氣地說著："要多喝點哦!" 這還只是尤爾根調配的其中一種。尤爾根了發明了好幾百種獨特的啤酒雞尾酒配方，而每一種配方都有一種最強烈的味道。其實尤爾根這樣做有一個目的——讓人們都認同啤酒就是"男人們的飲料"。用他自己的話來說，就是每個人都是喜歡啤酒的，而你只需要找到最適合你的口味，"他們對我說，‘我不喜歡啤酒'，但是我對他們說，‘不是這樣的，你只是不喜歡你現在喝的這種口味。'"他甚至想給全世界每個人都找出一種最適合他們的啤酒。他的這種持之以恒的態度確實令我們感到敬佩。

7."The Longest Bar In The World"

7.世界上最長的酒吧街

This is a local colloquialism for a square officially known as the Oude Market, located in Leuven.The market is basically a long, open courtyard with a line of businesses running along one side.So why is it called the longest bar in Europe? Well, over 40 of those businesses just happen tobe bars. Since each bar has an outdoor patio, the experience is one of an unbroken outdoorterrace that runs for nearly half a kilometer (0.3 mi).

這其實是一個位于比利時勒芬市被當地人稱作老市場的廣場而已。廣場其實是一條長長的半邊商業步行街式的庭院。那為什么要稱其為歐洲最長的酒吧街呢?其實是因為這條步行街上有超過40家酒吧。基于這里的每家酒吧都設置了室外的露天區，因此置身其中你就能感受到一個完整的露天平臺區都長達(0.3英里)半公里。

Of course, despite its name, it's not actually the longest bar in the world, or even Europe. Thereare several contenders to the title, most of them named by generations of locals who grew upwith the phrase and simply want to keep it alive in their home town. Nevertheless, the OudeMarket is a unique place to visit, and one of the bars, Domus, is even supplied by a directpipeline to its nearby brewery.And the other side of the square? That's a university. In manyparts of Belgium, especially Leuven, college students get beers for